head to head · open source
Zulip vs partykit
Zulip has 26,158 GitHub stars, 10,521 forks, 2,008 open issues and last shipped yesterday. partykit has 5,745 stars, 206 forks, 93 open issues and last shipped 25 days ago. Zulip leads on adoption by 355% (26,158 vs 5,745 stars). Zulip is written in Python under Apache-2.0; partykit is written in TypeScript under MIT. Zulip has attracted 40% as many forks as stars, partykit 4%. Zulip was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (collaboration), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Zulip | partykit | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 26K | ★ 5.7K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Python | TypeScript |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-10-09 |
| Forks | ⑂ 11K | ⑂ 206 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Zulip if
- You weight community size — 26K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick partykit if
- You want the partykit feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You evaluated both and partykit fits your workflow better
About Zulip
Zulip overview Zulip is an open source organized team chat app with unique [topic based threading][why zulip] that combines the best of email and chat to make remote work productive and delightful. Fortune 500 companies, [leading open source projects][rust case study], and thousands of other organizations use Zulip every day. Zulip is the only [modern team chat app][features] that is designed for both live and asynchronous conversations. Zulip is built by a distributed community of developers from all around the world, with 99+ people who have each contributed 100+ commits. With over 1,500 contributors merging…
read the full Zulip overview →
About partykit
PartyKit simplifies developing multiplayer applications. With PartyKit, you can focus on building multiplayer apps or adding real time experiences to your existing projects with as little as one line of code. Meanwhile, PartyKit will handle operational complexity and real time infrastructure scaling. [!NOTE] Current development of this project is in cloudflare/partykit. Documentation Go to docs.partykit.io for documentation, guides and examples. Quick start Note: to run PartyKit, you need to have Node v. 17 or higher installed. You can create a PartyKit project by running: This will ask a few questions about…
read the full partykit overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Zulip or partykit more popular?
Zulip has 26,158 GitHub stars and partykit has 5,745. Zulip has the larger community by that measure.
Are Zulip and partykit free?
Both are open source. Zulip is licensed under Apache-2.0 and partykit under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Zulip and partykit?
Zulip is written in Python and partykit in TypeScript. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Zulip or partykit?
Choose Zulip if you want the larger community (26,158 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose partykit if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.